[thelist] interactive charting

John DeStefano john.destefano at gmail.com
Wed Oct 4 08:39:57 CDT 2006


>I'm not sure I can yet visualize what you're seeking... type of chart
>(fever, bar, pie, etc)... type of data source (web service, inline data,
>form-based, etc)... type of interactions ("zoom in" sounds like some
>type of drilldown, or maybe it's a timeline expansion, etc).
>
I did a rather poor job of explaining this, didn't I? -- a result of
several factors, for all of which I apologize: I didn't want to bore
thelist with details that may not be of interest, but mainly, because
I am not sure myself exactly what is needed here, and neither are the
developers that need my help!

But your thoughts are spot-on: a web service provides guaranteed
bandwidth availability information from a source and destination
router via Netbeans.  The developers would like an interface that:
- presents bandwidth availability via chart (time vs. BW). They
invision a simple bar graph for this, and I can't envision an
alternative, but maybe you can?
- allows a user to click on an available "reservation" slot to:
-=- zoom in on (drill down into) a specific start date and time
-=- specify an end date and time
-=- enter and submit details related to that slot (duration, min. BW,
perhaps even specify details for a second reservation for return/ACK
traffic)
- utlimately on their wish list is a "drag" mechanism that allows a
user to click a spot on the chart as a start time, drag across to a
desired end time, and release to activate a dialog specific to that
timeline. However, since we have less than a month to get something up
and polished, we're not sure that's feasible for the immediate future.

The application is completely internal, but I could send snapshots of
the current interface if they would be of any interest.

>Am I correctly understanding that you have all the serverside data
>generation and request handling already taken care of, and that you're
>just looking for some types of clientside charting of this data, in each
>user's browser?
>

Yes: Netbeans data, just need client-side charting, and the ability to
interact with the data to reserve slots.

>If so, then the richest charting I know of is in Adobe Flex 2... samples
>can be tested on this page, under the "Charts" category:
>http://examples.adobe.com/flex2/inproduct/sdk/explorer/explorer.html
>

Sadly, this page won't seem to load for me in Linux/Firefox w/Flash
Player installed.

>Or maybe you were looking for a literal "zoom in" timeline slider, like
>Measuremap...?
>http://www.measuremap.com/developer/slider/
>

Now that looks interesting... in my environment, the sliders and tool
tips work nicely. Is there another level of interaction that I'm
missing, i.e., should I be able to zoom into the chart on click?  When
I click, it just moves the slider to the bar I'm clicking... if it
were able to zoom into that bar instead, it might be perfect!

>Or...?

I'm grateful for your help and open to suggestions.  I hope my further
explanation here makes a bit more sense; if not, I'd be happy to
provide more info.

Thanks,
~John



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